I am still reeling from Monday’s shooting at Virginia Tech, my alma mater and one of the few places I will always consider one of my true homes.  My mood has been pretty gray ever since Monday, when I followed the unfolding story throughout the day on my computer, seeing the death toll rise as the hours passed.  By the time the final numbers were in and evening started to settle in I was in a state of disbelief, wondering how such a gruesome event could happen in that tiny part of the world.

In all my conversations and emails with fellow Hokies we all say the same thing, that we simply can’t believe it.  I know each of us, at different moments, while watching and hearing various reports from the Va Tech campus on the internet, TV and NPR, have shed more than a few tears.  It is just too awful to contemplate, too terrible to imagine what it must have been like to have been on campus this past Monday.

I wrote recently of the lessons and strength that can be gleaned from tremendous challenges, and while I still believe this, I am having a difficult time coming to terms with the idea that whatever particular lessons lay in store for anyone and everyone affected by this tragedy had to come from…well, mass murder.  While I am deeply moved by the outpouring of support from all over the country and can already see how this tragedy is going to bring me closer to people I’ve lost touch with, I am still struck by the fact that this happened in a place and time in the victims’ lives when everything was supposed to be about safety, hope and taking the first steps towards creating a meaningful life.  College is such a pivotal time in life, a time to learn independence, to discover one’s passions and to meet the people who will have a profound impact on who one becomes as an "adult".  While at Virginia Tech, I met some of my dearest friends, my first husband, my mentor and more than a few professors who I still look to for quiet guidance and inspiration when I am feeling lost.  I was very involved in campus activities and was able to make at least some kind of small impact on university life while I was there and these are, to this day, some of my proudest achievements.

I look at my years at Virginia Tech as an incredibly precious time in my life where I first started to become the kind of person I wanted to be, where I was able to learn how to be a responsible human being in the midst of being a crazy college party girl.  There aren’t many times in life when we can be so silly, so dedicated, so wild, so committed and so spontaenous all at the same time.  College is about dragging yourself out of a cozy bed on a rainy day to trek across campus for your 8:00am class; it is about cheering until your voice is gone at Saturday football games; it is about eating too much pizza, drinking too much beer and complaining about dining hall food.  It is about making friends, stepping out of your comfort zones and learning how to spread your wings.

It shouldn’t be about SWAT teams, mass memorial services and watching your fellow students die right before your eyes.  It shouldn’t be about any of those things.  Ever.

In my car this morning, NPR aired a report from a candlelilght vigil that was held on campus last night.  The gathering was held on the Drill Field, which is a huge oval field – about the size of four football fields – that is the center of campus.  The reporter explained that after a few spoken words, a group of people on one end of the field began to sing Amazing Grace, while a group on the other end of the field began to cheer "HOKIES!" over and over again.  Hearing those cheers made me incredibly sad and inspired at the same time.  I am sorrowful that they are having to be chanted because of this tragedy, but they were also a reminder that this community is strong and will work together to carry each other onward.  The Virginia Tech community, which includes all of the students, faculty, university staff and administration, families and fellow alumni – and there are a lot of us, let me tell you – will not let this bring Virginia Tech down.  If anything, the entire population of us will tighten our grasps on each other and lighten the load for everyone.

"We will continue to invent the future through our blood and tears and through all our sadness … We are the Hokies …"  -Nikki Giovanni, University Distinguished Professor, poet, activist

To see Nikki Giovanni’s entire speech, click here.